Nova Core
by Helena Lucia
Summary: Those who rise highest descend farthest. Ahsoka Tano falls and never hits the ground. -Spoilers for Season Five's finale.-


_**Those Who Rise Highest...**_

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_...Descend farthest. Ahsoka Tano falls and never hits the ground._

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_**Disclaimer: Star War: Clone Wars characters do not belong to me.**_

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Loyalty. The ideal is imprinted on a Jedi's psyche from the time that they enter the Temple. Every trial of the body and spirit is an equal trial on the soul and mind. It is the bond which stretches across the Force, connecting and binding the Order's very foundations.

Duty. Duty to the Jedi Order, duty to the innocent, duty to the Republic, and a lifetime of duty in the service of peace. These ideals are a Jedi's roots. To walk the path of light in a galaxy of war, to lay down ones life in service of the Force. These are the moral obligations which build a Jedi's character. The bonds of integrity, the pledge of obedience, ones allegiance and deference to ones master.

This, Ahsoka knows, the beads which adorn her lekku, represent the bond to her Master. The Order's crest upon her armour which is the symbol of her obligation to the Republic. Her lightsabres exhibit the embodiment of the union of her soul and the Living Force.

"We are but seekers, not saints Ahsoka." Master Kenobi had intoned, lips curving in what might once have been a smile.

"Seekers of what, Master?" She had questioned, but could interpret little of his ambiguously cryptic reply.

"Seekers of the path, in a sense. Some seek truth and find knowledge, some seek power and find death, some seek trust and find betrayal. What a Jedi seeks is but the reflection of an impalpable future path within the Unifying Force."

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The electro-cuffs bite into the bones of Ahsoka's wrists with each quiver of the transport, and the clones' grip on her shoulder is just short of painful. Impersonal and unflinching, as if she is simply a traitorous wretch, and not their fearless Commander who has fought and killed and bled with them on filthy battlefields across a war-torn galaxy.

Anakin's voice echoes in the empty spaces within her mind, sharp with authority and outrage, pushing through their bond like an electric onslaught of untempered ire.

To seek trust and find betrayal, it burns as if she had taken her own lightsabre blade to her heart, the fire eating at her as it did on Mortis.

Ahsoka stands before the High Council, each word fuelling the storm of dark and light which surrounds her. The masked sentinels, elite Jedi guard, stand beneath her, and the most powerful of the Order above her, their faces implacable like worn stone. A contrast to the passionate rage which whispers against her senses, Anakin's aura an almost reassuring pressure beside her own.

Master Kenobi's eyes are like flints of ice turned on the other members of the High Council, a suppressed torrent of power sharpened with the Unifying Forces' premonitions.

"Reached an decision, we have." Says Master Yoda. "Though divided on this matter, the High Council is."

The Force is edged with the subtle undercurrents of Master Kenobi's displeasure, and Ahsoka wonders if perhaps she would have indeed succeeded as Master Kenobi's Padawan, despite Anakin's disagreement. Perhaps, she thinks, in some other universe.

"-thus expelled from the Jedi Order-"

"-your Padawan status will be stripped from you-"

"-and you will forfeit all rank and privileges within the grand army of the Republic."

Master Windu says, in dark and serious tones but she barely hears the words. The string of silky beads is taken from her lekku as the sentinel guards move to flank her. She notes that their masks are decorated with pale-gold symbols in some ancient language, and wonders on their meaning.

To search for truth and find knowledge, she thinks, and wishes she could embrace the Unifying Force with equal ease.

"-Hence forth, you are bared from the Jedi Order."

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The Senate chamber is shrouded in the thick, cloying force of the Darkside, pressing against her shields. Ahsoka stands before the Chancellor, looking every inch the Commander she no longer was. She can sense Anakin's aura along the edges of her senses, and thinks that perhaps it would have been better to fall to his lightsabre on Mortis, than to be tried for a crime she did not commit by this corrupt court.

The grand chamber doors slide open to admit four elite Jedi sentinels, Anakin striding before them, the Hero With no Fear as her defence against the Republic's court.

Barris, she thinks and then, to seek trust, to find death, to seek power, to find betrayal, to seek the true path, _find a blazing nova in a sea of stars_-

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"We understand that the Force works in mysterious ways," Master Windu says. "And in this trial you have become a better Jedi than you would have been otherwise."

A trial, Ahsoka wonders, is such the incandescent rage which builds in her chest, the treachery Barris had offered her when she reached for the bond of loyalty. Master Kenobi's eyes are solemn when Yoda offers her a chance to return to the Order, and Ahsoka thinks that perhaps he knows her choice already. Perhaps she would say, in some other universe.

"I'm sorry Master," She says to Anakin, fingers closing his over the string of beads which represent every trial she had passed during her apprenticeship. The bond between Master and Padawan. "but I'm not coming back."

He asks her to stay, and for a moment she wishes, that in some other universe she had killed Barris aboard the supply ship headed to the Ord Cestus medical station.

"The Council wouldn't trust me." She admits. "So how could I trust myself, Master?"

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Master Kenobi awaits her as she leaves the temple, the stone sentinels casting shadows over them in the waning sun. He does not ask her to stay, or even reconsider, and his eyes hold none of the ice from earlier, nor judgement over her decision.

"May the Force be with you, Ahsoka." He offers in that soft, inner-core accent, better suited to a princely diplomat than a warrior.

"And with you, Master Kenobi."

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_**Author's Note: So, the end of Season Five was suitably heartbreaking. Something of an interpreted tribute to the presumed end of Anakin and Ahsoka's partnership.**_


End file.
